Broken But Beautiful
by DisguisedasInnocent
Summary: Rachel isn't sure how someone can be so completely shattered, to look so broken and yet be so beautiful at the same time. All she knows is that Quinn Fabray manages to do exactly that. Post On My Way but no real spoilers. Faberry.


_Author's Note: My first Faberry piece in a while, it feels good to be returning to them, though I don't think my love affair with Quinntana is over (Come on people, Santana is just hot). I'm not sure exactly how this turned out, I don't normally write in second person but it just began to flow like this. Please, read and review, constructive criticism is always appreciated. _

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You know, you're not even sure you can breathe the first time that you see her lying prone on that hospital bed, looking like a broken doll waiting for repair. Your eyes scan up her body, beginning with her feet, taking in their shape even though the blankets obscure them. What you can see is the heavy pot that is strapped around her left ankle and the bulky bandages that hold her right femur tightly. Somehow, you know that it broke during the crash but you don't know why, you just do. Then your dark brown eyes trail up towards the blonde haired girl's hips, her hands lay on either side of her waist just beside her hips above the blankets. Both are covered in white bandages, but in places, dots of red show through the fabric. You tell yourself that your heart doesn't break at the sight, but you know it does.

Your eyes continue the course up Quinn Fabray's body, marvelling at the fact that it seemed to be hanging together, but your eyes told you that it wasn't flesh and bone keeping the girl's body in one piece. A mass of metal, stitches and bandages wrapped Quinn's fragile form in a tight embrace and prevented the girl's insides from becoming her outsides. You can see the wires hanging around her bed, the tubes that are connected to various sections of the girl's body, drifting under the protective layer of her hospital gown. It prevents you from seeing the long cut along the girl's stomach, held together by staples of metal and strings of wire. What it doesn't prevent you from seeing is the tube that extents out from the side of the gown and connects to a container hanging on the side of the girl's bed. It's filling slowly with a fuzzy pink liquid and for some reason you immediately know that it's draining her lungs. You don't know if your heart breaks, but you're pretty sure that it hurts like it has.

The length of the pale girl's neck is marred with a deep green bruise. It reveals nothing about the accident but everything about the force behind the impact. The force that threw Quinn's body forwards into the steering wheel of her car before knocking her backwards into the seat and then rocking her from side to side as if she were a play toy being tugged at by a young energetic dog. It's the sight of Quinn's face that immediately shatters you. Not because it's made her ugly, you know that nothing could ever manage to make Quinn Fabray ugly or anything less than beautiful. It's the fact that that between her lips is a breathing tube that extents down into the girl's partly deflated lungs, the ventilator connected to the tube forcing air into the girl's chest, breathing for her. That's what hurts. That sight makes your own chest hurt and your throat burn. You know your heart is broken but you don't know how to change that, or if you would if you could. It feels good to have a broken heart when you see Quinn looking so utterly shattered.

There is a four-inch cut above the girl's left eye. It curls around the shape of her forehead, moving upwards into her hairline in a way that manages to hide the full length of the gash but you know it's there and that hurts. What hurts more is the knowledge that there are fifteen staples hanging into Quinn's skin to keep the wound together. Then what makes that hurt worse is the knowledge that in a matter of weeks those fifteen staples will be removed from Quinn's flesh so that numerous stitches can be put in their place. It doesn't make Quinn any less beautiful though. You know that it couldn't because she is Quinn, and that means that she's gorgeous.

You are pretty sure that you don't move from the chair beside the girl's bed for the entire time that she is awake. Although, you know you've changed clothes and gone to the bathroom, but you know you haven't left for an extended period of time. It's just you and Quinn, her broken hand resting lightly within your strong one as your thumb strokes her skin and you whisper that you finally understand. You finally know why she's telling you that you cannot marry Finn, and you know that it doesn't hurt that badly any more to admit to yourself that you love Quinn Fabray.

The first time that she opens her eyes, you smile at her and whisper that you love her. She smiles back and you know you've never seen a more beautiful sight.


End file.
